Cryptoquote Spoiler – 12/28/17

“Mistakes are part of the game.  It’s how well you recover from them, that’s the mark of a great player.”   —   Alice Cooper

(Our first Alice Cooper quote!  At least, since I’ve been posting these spoilers that is.  I always got a kick out of “Alice” Cooper.  And, to an extent, “Marilyn” Manson.  Kind of a reversal of George Sand,  George Eliot, and Isak Dinesen, to name a few.  For a completely different reason, I know.  But, still amusing to me.  Be well and do good, friends.)   —   YUR

Jumble Spoiler – 12/28/17

Visual Description:  Rollin’, rollin’, rollin’.  Keep them dogfish rollin’.  Keep them dogfish rollin’, rawfish!!!

HABEY  =  HYENA,  VARFO  =  FAVOR,  TONINO  =  NOTION,  EPTREM  =  TEMPER   —   Giving us:  HYAFAVOINTEER

Clue/Question:  Restaurants in Tokyo sell sushi to customers who – – –

Answer:  HAVE A YEN FOR IT

(I’m not real up on the exchange rate for the Yen, but I’m pretty sure you’d need much more than “A YEN” to pay for sushi.  But, this did make for a fun pun.  I knew the answer immediately, so I handed it off to my 26 year old daughter, to see if she was familiar enough with the idiom, to come up with the answer.  She wasn’t!  From the wording of the clue/question, she did figure out that the first two words were HAVE A, but I had to give her a hint for the third word.  She only knew YEN as a currency, and not as a synonym for desire. 

The guys have to be careful with these types of cartoon/puzzles though.  There could be some militant Asian types who – somehow – find this offensive!  “Why?” you might ask.  The better question these days is “Why not?”.  Because, give an overly sensitive type an inch, and they’ll take a mile.  Or, take you to court.  Actual court, or the court of public opinion, aka:  social media.  Where the butterfly affect almost always takes a minor ripple, and turns it into a freaking tsunami.   Always quick to judge . . . and convict, using today’s morays.  But, usually reticent to forgive – or even understand – the fact that people viewed a slew of things differently in the past. 

And, forget about retractions.  Charges and allegations are always Front Page HEADLINE News, while the withdrawal of the insulting, slanderous aspersions are almost always buried on page nine or ten, in a very minor font.  Forgive the old-school newspaper reference.  I can’t think of the instant gratification equivalent. 

But, suffice to say that I am not happy with today’s “political correctness”, because it has just become an absolute mania.  It’s the 21st Century version of the Salem witch hunts, or the 1950’s McCarthy Era “communist” outing and shaming.  Low, low depths in American history.  And, if you try to play devil’s advocate, or try to see the other side of the coin, you also get branded as some kind of traitor.  It has become ludicrous, because the people who had always preached tolerance are now the intolerant ones.  I hate the term, because I’ve always considered myself a very progressive liberal, but I think we are experiencing a kind of liberal fascism.  We really need to take a step, or two, back . . . and just breathe.  Or pretty soon we all might be reciting a revised version of “First They Came . . .”  Be well and do good, friends.)   —   YUR